Pillars of Vermont, Luigi Lucioni | |
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Bennington Museum Monthly
Summer rolls on in July with more music, delicious food, and outdoor sculpture. Additionally, we have some excellent educational programming and the opening of a major exhibit this month. Remember, we are open until 7pm on Fridays, so come on down as your schedule suits you and see Bennington Museum alive with new events, artwork, and entertainment!
A Call to Action
We are nearing the end of our fiscal year (June 30) and we are making one final call for donations. Bennington Museum is a special place where people of all ages, backgrounds, and financial means can learn about our shared history, enjoy music and art, and join a community of cultural lovers that spans all 50 states and 30+ foreign countries.
Each year, we ask our visitors and digital followers to pitch in whatever they can comfortably afford to keep our programming going strong and our collections in good shape. If every reader of this email donated just $5 today, we would reach our goal.
If the Museum makes a difference in your life, please just click on the link below to help ensure that next year is the best it can be.
You make what we do possible. Thank you.
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Saturday, 7/1
10am - 12pm
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Summer Sampler Class for Youth
This WEEKLY class offers children and young people a chance to learn the art of needlework samplers, working at their own pace. Girls and boys ages 7 through 17 are invited to join – no experience required!
$85 Museum Members / $100 Not-Yet-Members
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Concerts in the Courtyard: MOOSE CROSSING
Zak Hampton, Joe Plotts, and Brian DeAngelo present MOOSE CROSSING; bringing high-energy jazz, fused w/ funk, rock, & blues to the New England area for over 10 years. Performing takes on classics from Duke Ellington and Frank Sinatra to more contemporary jazz-flavored takes on songs from The Beatles and Bruno Mars, there’s something for every music lover in this group.
This event is FREE thanks to an anonymous grant. Food and drink for sale by the Avocado Pit.
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Concerts in the Courtyard:
The Insolent Willies
The Insolent Willies is an upstate New York-based acoustic roots-rock band known for their hip-shaking mix of quirky, clever original music and unpredictable covers. The band’s current lineup includes Bill Ackerbauer, Frank DeVer Pullen, Paul Gavry, and Evan Gavry.
Nominated for a Capital Region Eddie Award in 2022, The Insolent Willies have released two albums (“Five for the Road” and “Mostly Harmless Acoustic Mayhem”), and another album of original material is expected to be released in the summer of 2023.
This event is FREE thanks to an anonymous grant. Food and drink for sale by the Avocado Pit.
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Concerts in the Courtyard:
The Throwbacks
Come rock and roll with Vermont’s premier oldies band, The Throwbacks! Playing classics from the 50s through the 70s, this is a show you won’t want to miss!
This event is FREE thanks to an anonymous grant. Food and drink for sale by the Avocado Pit.
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Concerts in the Courtyard:
Matt Edwards and Buck2fifty
The current line-up of Buck2Fifty is Louisiana native Matt Edwards on piano and vocals, Jeff McRae on percussion, and Dave Cuite on upright bass. They have played for weddings, parties, dances, and festivals throughout the local area. Their type of Louisiana Flavored Rhythm and Blues is appealing to all ages.
This event is FREE thanks to an anonymous grant. Food and drink for sale by the Avocado Pit.
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Weekend Courtyard Cafe
Shanta Ghosh will serve delicious Eastern dishes on sunny Saturdays until September 9th. Advance orders are welcome. Watch our facebook page in case of cancellations.
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For the Love of Vermont:
The Lyman Orton Collection
One Exhibition, Two Venues
July 1–November 5 at Bennington Museum (opening celebration July 15)
July 22–November 5 at Southern Vermont Arts Center (opening celebration July 22)
Two White Oxen in Winter, Kyra Markham
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More than 200 works of art that capture Vermont’s unique character, people, traditions and landscape prior to the 1970’s from the collection of Lyman Orton, proprietor of the Vermont Country Store, will be unveiled to the public in an unprecedented collaboration by two of Vermont’s most celebrated cultural centers.
The Orton Collection focuses primarily on work from 1920 to 1960, the exhibition includes works on canvas, board, paper, and mixed media, everything from oil paintings to wood engravings to originals of Saturday Evening Post magazine cover illustrations. More than 65 artists will be represented including Rockwell Kent, John Clymer, Churchill Ettinger, Paul Sample, Mead Schaeffer, John Atherton, Marion Huse, Luigi Lucioni, Kyra Markham, Bernadine Custer, Milton Avery, and others. Many applied for work with the New Deal and the Federal Arts Project during the Great Depression. A significant part of the collection is artworks by Vermont women, as well as by women who journeyed into the mountains to draw and paint.
According to Jamie Franklin, curator, Bennington Museum, “Because Vermont is rural, and because it is a place that is culture-rich but money-poor, there haven’t been a lot of independent efforts to focus on the artists who lived in Vermont and who depicted this place and the people who live here. Orton’s collection is the collection of Vermont art of the 20th century.”
The exhibition showcases works by artists who became famous in their lifetimes, as well as artists that did not reach that level of achievement, yet they produced paintings of their time in Vermont and that, Orton notes, “is the point of my collection. It’s more about capturing the essence of a place, learning from that.”
A “Vermonty” Experience: Orton believes art should be enjoyed and accessible to all — walking into a museum or art gallery should not be an intimidating experience. Museum-goers will experience a yesteryear coziness with contemporary artifacts and environments that illustrate the context of some of the paintings—all to bring additional dimension and history to the artworks with explanatory descriptions posted in everyday language.
The Book: A 220-page book tells the story of how Orton assembled the collection over many years while still running The Vermont Country Store. It is also packed with photographs of the paintings, as well as stories of the artists and their love of Vermont. For the Love of Vermont: The Lyman Orton Collection, authored in collaboration with Orton, by Anita Rafael, a writer living and working in Wardsboro, VT, is available in the Museum shop.
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Haunted Vermont
July 22 - December 31, 2023
Vermont has a long and storied history of otherworldly intrigue, ranging from accusations of witches in Pownal and vampires in Manchester, to Spiritualists communicating with the dead, haunted covered bridges, and our very own Bennington Triangle. Shirley Jackson, perhaps the greatest writer of the horror/gothic fiction genre in the 20th-century, lived and worked for most of her career in North Bennington. Drawing on this rich framework of historical tales of monsters, ghosts, missing persons and the occult, Haunted Vermont, will tell these stories and more.
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June 17 - November 12, 2023
This year marks the 26th anniversary of the North Bennington Outdoor Sculpture Show (NBOSS), one of the region’s premiere arts events of the summer/fall season, featuring work by some of the best artists from the Bennington area, the state of Vermont, and throughout the northeast.
For more information about the Museum artists and their creations, a map, and how to purchase a piece, please visit the NBOSS page of our website. Visit nbossvt.com for more information about all of the artists.
SAVE THE DATE
Artist Reception at Bennington Museum: September 8, 2023 Time: 5-7pm
Featuring music by SIRSY and stilt-walker Troy Wunderle, plus hot dogs and PBR.
Closing Date: November 11, 2023
Hours: self-guided, open 24/7, and free to the public.
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Juneteenth 2023
The death of slavery was painfully slow and uneven in this country, even in northern states like Vermont. Slavery was well established in New England in the 1700s, and some of the earliest white settlers brought enslaved Black people with them when they came to Bennington.
Among the enslavers in Bennington was our famous proprietor of the Catamount Tavern and supporter of the Green Mountain Boys, Stephen Fay. In 1772 Fay purchased two enslaved people from Hadley Massachusetts, Pomp Morgan, and Margaret Bowen (called Peg). Pomp and Peg had tried to get married in Hadley, but Pomp’s enslaver had not allowed it. It appears that Peg’s enslavers gave her a choice. She could go to Vermont with her lover, or stay in Massachusetts with her two children (Rose and Phillis were 11 and 7 years old). She chose her husband.
We know very little about the couple’s life in Bennington. Back in Hadley, Peg’s daughter Rose gave birth to a daughter. Three days later Peg’s other daughter, Phillis, died of tuberculosis and the new baby was named after her. Peg did not meet her granddaughter until she was sold back to Charles Phelps, Jr. in 1778. We do not know what happened to Pomp Morgan. He may have died in Bennington, been sold to another enslaver, or perhaps gained his freedom.
Slavery was controversial in Colonial America. Particularly as the Colonists started to fight for freedom from England, some people acknowledged the unfree Black people in their midst.
Vermont declared itself an independent republic in 1777 after years of wrangling between New Hampshire and New York over its territory. Its new Constitution, signed July 8, 1777, abolished adult slavery. Vermont was the first future state to take a step like this. Vermonters are justly proud of this fact.
The Vermont Constitution abolished adult slavery in 1777 but Marget Bowen (who was in her 30s) was enslaved here through 1778. The Vermont Constitution was not a perfectly effective emancipation document. Many Vermonters were at best ambivalent about slavery and some were also ambivalent about the Republic of Vermont. This ambivalence toward slavery even applies to the writers of that Constitution. Stephen Fay’s son Jonas was the primary author of the Constitution which he signed July 8, 1777. March 6, 1778 (nearly a year later), he signed a receipt witnessing the sale of Peg from Stephen Fay of Bennington, Vermont to Charles Phelps of Hadley, Massachusetts.
There are other examples of Vermonters enslaving Black people after 1777, including David Avery, the second pastor of the Old First Church, and Moses Sage, North Bennington’s most prosperous citizen.
There are also examples of Vermonters who actively fought against slavery, and who tried to make the rhetoric of freedom into reality for everyone. After the Battle of Saratoga, Ebenezer Allen’s company of Rangers captured a Black woman named Dinah Mattis and her young daughter Nancy, who had been enslaved in Burgoyne’s army. With his company’s blessing, he made a special trip to Bennington to ensure their freedom. In his manumission notice, recorded in Bennington by the Town Clerk on November 27, 1777 he stated, “it is not right in the sight of God to keep slaves." Other Vermonters may have felt the same way, but many, like Jonas Fay, were silent witnesses.
When Vermont joined the United States in 1791, it was (on paper) a free state. The first Vermont state census reported only free Black people in the state. The Vermont Gazette, printed at Bennington declared, "The return of the marshal's assistant for the county of Bennington shows that there are in the county…17 black males over 4 and under 16; 15 black females… To the honor of humanity, no slaves." The Gazette’s assertion was naive and optimistic. There were indeed examples of enslaved Vermonters up through the 1840s at least.
It is important to recognize that the abolition of slavery was never a foregone conclusion. Social progress did not happen in this country as part of a natural course of events. Progress happened because of choices that individual people made and the hard work that they did. There have been many setbacks along the way. Dinah and Nancy Mattis were freed in 1777, but Margaret Bowen, enslaved in Bennington despite the declaration in the 1777 Vermont Constitution, was not manumitted until 1782 in Massachusetts.
We cannot change the past, but we can acknowledge that slavery happened, and we can be inspired by people who continue to fight against racism.
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Know all men by these Presents that I Stephen Fay of Bennington in the State of Vermont, in Consideration of Twenty pounds Lawful money paid before the Delivery hereof by Charles Phelps of Hadley in the State of Massachusetts Bay, do make Bargain, Sell, Sett over and Deliver unto the said Charles Phelps his heirs Executors Administrators and Assigns forever one Negro Wench named Pegg, Witness my hand and seal at Bennington this Sixth day of March AD 1778 Signed Sealed & Delivered in Presence of Stephen Fay.
Jonas Fay
Porter-Phelps-Huntington Family Papers, Robert S. Cox Special Collections and University Archives Research Center, UMass Amherst Libraries.
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Head Quarters Pollet 28th of November 1777. To whom It may Concern Know ye whereas Dinah Mattis, a negro woman with Nancey her Child of two months old was taken Prisoner on Lake Champlain, with the British Troops Some where near Col Gillner's Patton the Twelth day of Instant November by a Scout under my Command, and according to a Resolve Past by the Honorable Continental Congress that all Prisnors belong to the Captivators thereof therefore She and her Child became the just Property of the Captivators thereof-I being Conscientious that it is not Right in the Sight of god to Keep Staves, I therefore obtaining Leave of the Detachment under my Command to give her and her Child their freedom I do therefore give the said Dinah... and Nancy
her Child there freedom to pass and Repass any where through the United States of America with her Behaving as becometh and to Trade and to Traffick for her Self and Child as tho She Were Born free without being Mollested by any Person or Persons. In witness whereunto I have Set my hand or subscribed my Name – Ebenezer Allen, Capt.
This manumission notice is part of the Bennington Town Records.
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STAY CONNECTED
802-447-1571
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Bennington Museum engages and transforms our visitors and our community by connecting you to the region’s diverse arts, rich history, and culture of innovation.
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